Are You Ready For No Football?

The Sports Buzz - Jerry Greene's From The Cheap Seat

Can you start the XFL this coming Sunday? You show it -- I'll watch it.

McMahon is right. I'm not ready for weekend TV without the NFL.

Sunday was kind of like one of those quit-smoking patches you wear to kick the habit. Instead of real NFL football, we were given the patch of the Pro Bowl Game, which is NFL Lite. Same guys -- just no reason to care who wins or loses. (And if you don't care who wins or loses any game -- what are you doing here?)

Sunday early afternoon TV was tough as the Pro Bowl didn't start until 5:30. Here were the top choices:

A gazillion basketball games, college and pro. No offense, but that doesn't work until March. . . . Women's soccer, an exhibition match between the U.S. and Norway. Far as I know, everyone kept on their clothes. . . . The NHL All-Star Game -- North America vs. the World. Strange to see this take place in Toronto. Even stranger to realize that four of the six Canadian teams may not exist by next year's game and only 17 Canadians were among the 50 players.

Here we go. The Davis Cup, the U.S. vs. Zimbabwe. In hockey, we're taking on the world (with a little help from Canada), but in men's tennis, we're struggling to beat Zimbabwe?

American Chris Woodruff appeared beaten after losing the second set on a tiebreaker and immediately falling behind 2-0 in the third. But he made a tremendous rally to win his match and send the U.S. into the second round.

No touchdowns, but pretty good . . . even if I did feel bad for Zimbabwe.

Pebble Beach? Well, I tried watching, but they kept showing those golfing legends Kevin Costner and Ken Griffey Jr. . . . The network rarely even posted the pros' scores -- perhaps terrified of letting us know the tournament was not being led by Tiger Woods or even Costner but by Matt Gogel.

XFL POSTSCRIPTS: Upon further review, I can't help but wonder if the clever Mr. McMahon is hoping the NFL will buy into his spring league instead of ignoring it or fighting it. Consider -- (1) It would give the NFL a true development league in this country; (2) It would lock up the entire TV year for the NFL; (3) A connection with the WWF would bring that young male demographic that the NFL covets. . . . The one drawback would be the criticism the NFL would face from the older male demographic (including most team owners who would rather die than be caught between The Rock and Triple H).

DID YOU KNOW? . . .

After climbing from beneath his rock, John Rocker saw his shadow. We will have six weeks without another bigoted remark. . . .

Unless I missed it in the news, St. Louis won a major sports championship without a single riot afterward. . . .

Back to the WWF, they just signed WCW refugee Chris Benoit for $400,000 a year. Also escaping from the crumbling WCW were Dean Malenko, Eddie Guerrero and Perry Saturn, who got $250,000 each from the dominant federation. . . .

Don't you love to know the names of famous football plays? Anyway, that Super Bowl-winning 73-yard pass play from Warner to Isaac Bruce was ````Twins Right, Ace Right, 999 Halfback Balloon.''